Southwest Airlines had announced on Thursday (April 11) to ground the Boeing 737 Max planes for this year’s summer travel.
Southwest released a summer schedule till June 7 last month which has been tweaked to August 5 as per the announcement on Thursday. There will be replacements done foe the absence of the grounded aircrafts.
President of the Southwest Airlines, Thomas M. Nealon reportedly stated that the move has been made to reduce last minute flight changes and bolster reliability and punctuality of the airline.
The 737 Max was grounded in March after one of the aircraft under the Ethiopian Airlines crashed that killed every passenger onboard. Investigation is still ongoing in this matter that killed 346 people in total. It was the second accident involving the jet model within six months’ time. The first incident concerned Indonesia’s Lion Air flight that crashed last October.
After the consecutive accidents airlines have started to put a stopper on ordering the 737 Max planes. Boeing has halted deliveries of the 737 Max and had stated its plans to bring down production of the aircraft for the time being. The focal point of the crash investigations is the plane’s automatic safety system, for which Boeing says it is testing for a software fix.
Though the change in schedule has been accommodated for the most part, some valued customers had to suffer inconvenience due to the alterations. Nealon had advised passengers to book their tickets well ahead of their journey to avoid situations that causes difficulty.
